A host of acts are due to perform at this year’s Kendal Live Music Festival.
Organiser Kendal Business Improvement District has announced the popular event will return for a second year in October.
“There will be about 100 different bands and acts performing across around 20 different venues in Kendal – with about 200 performances in total,” said Josh Macaulay, chair of Kendal BID.
“There will be all sorts of genres featured, from original music to covers, jazz, folk and acoustic, so something for everybody to enjoy.”
He explained that 90 per cent of the acts would be from within a ten-mile radius of Kendal and the ones from further afield had been chosen because they regularly played in Kendal or had a strong following in the town.
“We trialled the festival last October and it was really successful,” said Josh.
“We received great feedback from the different venues in the town and from those attending. There were lots of calls for us to stage it again so the BID board has approved it for another year and we have expanded it to two days.”
The festival will take place on Friday, October 6 and Saturday, October 7, with bands performing from around 11.30am until late each day.
Acts performing include:
- OTT, who are well known in the area and describe themselves as an awesome four-piece party band playing big hits both old and new
- Drum Nation, Kendal’s own home-grown samba drumming collective
- Thieving Magpies, a rock, rhythm and blues band with a hint of reggae
- Shelly’s Bane, an energetic, indie rock/pop covers band
Other performers will include Rock It Man, The Size, Batala, Big Trouble, Heavy Energy, Black Sheep, Molly Warburton and Ava Grace.
There will be three outdoor stages on the Saturday, including the main stage and a marquee in Market Place.
“We will also be building a student stage at the Birdcage for young musicians to perform,” said Josh.
“This will be run by Kendal College’s music department to introduce new young talent in the area. For most of them it will be the first time they have performed at a festival so hopefully it will be a great confidence booster for them.”
A third outdoor stage – the Secret Stage – will be at a venue to be confirmed.
Other venues hosting performances over the two-day festival will include Smokie’s Retro Bar, The New Union, The Factory Tap, The Horse & Rainbow, The Shakespeare, George & Dragon, 19 The Wine Bar and Mason’s Yard 24.
“We put on the festival in October last year to give Kendal businesses a boost in a month which is traditionally quite quiet,” said Josh.
“In September the town is still feeling the positive effects of the summer, in November you have the Kendal Mountain Festival and in December you have Christmas but October is a ‘dip month’, particularly since the Lakes International Comic Art Festival moved to Bowness.
“We want Kendal to be a great place for businesses and for people to work but also to be a great place to live, where there are good things going on to help keep young people here and retain the workforce.
“We hope the festival will be a great event for the community. It promises to be a rocking good weekend for everyone!”
Kendal BID, a not-for-profit organisation, was established in 2014 and is now in its second five-year period of operation.
Its wide range of activities include marketing Kendal as a destination for visitors, running projects and providing benefits to businesses and the public that use them.
Kendal BID funds the Discover Kendal app, which highlights shops, food and drink establishments, businesses, attractions and varied things to do in the town, and sponsors the business section of the Visit Kendal website.
It can also award shop front grants to help businesses decorate or generally improve their frontages.
